Dave

I’m a creative person who’s managed operations and owned businesses. I’ve worked with organizations to help them solve problems and capitalize on opportunities. I have been CEO, president, or executive director of a mix of five organizations, both nonprofit and for-profit. I have deep interests in the process of communication in all its guises and in how community coalesces, develops, and impacts systems.

Throughout most of my working life, I’ve been a writer, photographer, and designer in one way or another. I still write, shoot, and design. I wouldn’t ever want to give up those hands-on endeavors. A long time ago I found out that I learn by doing—process teaches.

More recently, I was the executive director of the Gestalt Institute of Cleveland, and these days, I advise both start-ups and mature businesses and ghostwrite books. However, I’ve been lucky enough to work for or with a diversity of great organizations and people including:

I’ve been a business reporter, newspaper and magazine editor, magazine publisher, PR person, corporate communications manager, college professor, fundraiser, Web and e-commerce director, and a marketing director. I’ve written books, designed websites, marketed products and services, managed sales forces, helped nonprofits raise better than a hundred million dollars, and negotiated the sale of businesses.

Karen and I are nestled into our loft in downtown Cleveland now, but I’ve lived in a lot of places including:

Ohio

New York

Elsewhere

Cleveland

Nedrow

Carmel, CA

Cleveland Heights

Syracuse

Little Rock, AR

Shaker Heights

Otisco Lake

Erie, PA

East Cleveland

Central Square

Honolulu, HI

Bath

Manhattan NYC

Ottawa, KS

Doylestown

Brooklyn Heights NYC

Cuyahoga Falls

North Canton

Now for some deep background: If by any chance you’re wondering whether I’m the Dave Patterson you shared experiences with in a one-room schoolhouse in upstate New York in the 1950s, or at a small high school in South Onondaga, New York in the ’60s, or later at Syracuse University, Ottawa University, or the University of Hawaii there’s a good shot I am.